The Tragic Choicesless World of Anna D.
So awhile ago I fell into the Fundie Snark community on Reddit. Which honestly was kinda a spin-off of my odd fascination with the so-called "Quiver full movement".
Side Note: It may be high time I got a Reddit Adventures tag put in place. Eh we'll see.
But this lead me down the wacky path of the Duggar Snark community. You know, that hyper religious family with about 13 too many children. They had a show and a couple of spin-off shows chronicling their life and whatever. Well, as you know the oldest one was arrested, tried, and convicted for both possession and receiving child assault materials.
Yeah about that, it had came out that he had abused 4 if his sisters and another young girl when he was a teenager. So what would make someone think that situation would get any better by doing nothing?
"But we sent him to dig ditches for a couple of months and had a police officer talk to him."
Yeah and that same "cop" is in prison for something like 50 years for assaulting a child and your oldest is going to be joining him, soooooo...??? Exactly what did any of that accomplish???
Look, I have seen the Reddit posts by people who are like that (the P word that rhymes with Lido) and while it's probably really hard for them to receive any kind of help because of the stigma and automatic presumption of having already committed a crime against a child (even if they haven't), but there is where my sympathy ends for these people.
There should be a highly specialized field of psychiatry that focuses on people like this who haven't committed a crime against a child to help/ prevent them from offending. But if you've hurt a child, it should be like the alligator thing in Florida. In Florida, if an alligator eats a person, the alligator is euthanized.
Sigh...
But getting to the crux of this entry which is the pest's (which is what the oldest is called in the Fundie/ Duggar Snark community) wife, Anna.
I recently watched some guy who is a non-verbal communications expert and his wife dissect the pest's proposal and it was super uncomfortable to watch. She didn't look happy or excited for that engagement or marriage. According to the expert dude, Anna's non-verbal communication read as scared and/ or uncomfortable the entire time.
So here is the problem. From what I understand in the Fundie Snark community, people are split about Anna Duggar. You have the "she chose this so I don't feel sorry for her" crowd and you have the "she has no choice" crowd. Me, I'm in the second group, especially after watching the non-verbal communication guys' video.
In the fundamentalist world, women have no agency over their lives. They are groomed from birth thinking that men are the keepers of the house and everything must go through them, because they get direct orders from God, so it must be infallible.
Uh Side Note: What in this differs from the Taliban? Like, seriously, can someone explain the difference to me because it seems like the exact same thing.
Men take direct orders from God: check
Extreme interpretation of religious texts: check
Promoting violence and/or a willingness to die in the name of X diety: check
Women are subservient to men and should only rear children and never work: check
Women must be modest at all times: check
Extolling their religion/ religious beliefs while demonizing all others: check mate
Soooo, yeah. Same thing different deity to suck up too.
But getting back to the point of this meandering entry.
I know Anna Duggar has made some bonkers statements, like the one the Snark community harps on "at least I have a husband." Or constantly proclaiming happiness with her life, but this is the thing.
This is a woman who grew up being told defer to men, which means father then husband, because you have no agency expect what these men tell you. She has a high school education if that. Fundies aren't known for being educational/ intellectual powerhouses. She married into what is well, was widely considered, the pinnacle of Fundie families then compound that with marrying the heir to the throne. Fulfilling the high expectations of her being the docile obedient broodmare wife is all she really could be and that's really sad.
You can't really blame her for blindly following this path because that's all she was ever groomed for. From the beginning, she was told to pray for a husband, no matter how fucked up and/or flawed he would be. After all, being married to a monster is more preferable to being a withered old spinster.
Nah, given the options of Josh or spinsterhood, I'd definitely choose spinsterhood, but I'm not a Fundie.
The argument that she is choosing this path and can leave at any time is pretty laughable. All she knows is Fundie world. In Fundie World, divorce is not something good women do. Good women suffer in silence. Also what would God say?! She would be turning her back on her sacred marriage vows and that would dishonor God, herself and her children.
But let's pull the Christian Fundamentalism aspect out of her leaving. She has seven children, one of which was just born a few months ago. If she were to leave where could she go? Her entire world is that of the Christian Fundamentalist community. If they all turn their backs on her what is she going to do for support? Jim Boob (another Snark community reference) isn't likely to help a woman who abandoned his precious first born in his hour of need and he definitely seems like the type to use every legal trick in the book to take her children away from her forever.
Side Note: If you think about it, this seems like an excellent way to keep your women under control. Leave them educationally neglected and completely unable to financially provide for themselves let alone the 4+ children they've been saddled with. Then threaten them with legally removing the children if the threat of pissing off God and going to hell isn't scary enough. That's really fucked up.
Ultimately, if Anna Duggar did leave she would need a lot of support systems to make sure she never went back. She definitely would need trauma therapy, regular therapy (specifically a therapist that specializes in spiritual abuse and/or cults), some form of financial support, basic adult education classes, housing for her and all her children, and competent legal representation, I.e. extremely expensive legal representation. I don't see any of that happening for her. From where I'm sitting that all seems very daunting and I'm an outsider looking in, I'm certain that would seem like an impossibility if I were her. So she is ultimately left with no other options but to remain a dutiful and "docile obedient broodmare wife" who is hopelessly trapped in an unhappy sham marriage to an atrocious monster who will more than likely spend at least 5 years in prison (fingers crossed that it will be at least 15 years) for the disgusting crimes he's committed.
Anna Duggar sadly doesn't have any easy choices available to her, so she takes the easy way out. Actually, it's not the easy way out, it's more or less the disassociative way out. Having pretty much no good choices isn't a choice at all, so for her the beat goes on but only because there is no other beat to dance to.
Side Note: It may be high time I got a Reddit Adventures tag put in place. Eh we'll see.
But this lead me down the wacky path of the Duggar Snark community. You know, that hyper religious family with about 13 too many children. They had a show and a couple of spin-off shows chronicling their life and whatever. Well, as you know the oldest one was arrested, tried, and convicted for both possession and receiving child assault materials.
Yeah about that, it had came out that he had abused 4 if his sisters and another young girl when he was a teenager. So what would make someone think that situation would get any better by doing nothing?
"But we sent him to dig ditches for a couple of months and had a police officer talk to him."
Yeah and that same "cop" is in prison for something like 50 years for assaulting a child and your oldest is going to be joining him, soooooo...??? Exactly what did any of that accomplish???
Look, I have seen the Reddit posts by people who are like that (the P word that rhymes with Lido) and while it's probably really hard for them to receive any kind of help because of the stigma and automatic presumption of having already committed a crime against a child (even if they haven't), but there is where my sympathy ends for these people.
There should be a highly specialized field of psychiatry that focuses on people like this who haven't committed a crime against a child to help/ prevent them from offending. But if you've hurt a child, it should be like the alligator thing in Florida. In Florida, if an alligator eats a person, the alligator is euthanized.
Sigh...
But getting to the crux of this entry which is the pest's (which is what the oldest is called in the Fundie/ Duggar Snark community) wife, Anna.
I recently watched some guy who is a non-verbal communications expert and his wife dissect the pest's proposal and it was super uncomfortable to watch. She didn't look happy or excited for that engagement or marriage. According to the expert dude, Anna's non-verbal communication read as scared and/ or uncomfortable the entire time.
So here is the problem. From what I understand in the Fundie Snark community, people are split about Anna Duggar. You have the "she chose this so I don't feel sorry for her" crowd and you have the "she has no choice" crowd. Me, I'm in the second group, especially after watching the non-verbal communication guys' video.
In the fundamentalist world, women have no agency over their lives. They are groomed from birth thinking that men are the keepers of the house and everything must go through them, because they get direct orders from God, so it must be infallible.
Uh Side Note: What in this differs from the Taliban? Like, seriously, can someone explain the difference to me because it seems like the exact same thing.
Men take direct orders from God: check
Extreme interpretation of religious texts: check
Promoting violence and/or a willingness to die in the name of X diety: check
Women are subservient to men and should only rear children and never work: check
Women must be modest at all times: check
Extolling their religion/ religious beliefs while demonizing all others: check mate
Soooo, yeah. Same thing different deity to suck up too.
But getting back to the point of this meandering entry.
I know Anna Duggar has made some bonkers statements, like the one the Snark community harps on "at least I have a husband." Or constantly proclaiming happiness with her life, but this is the thing.
This is a woman who grew up being told defer to men, which means father then husband, because you have no agency expect what these men tell you. She has a high school education if that. Fundies aren't known for being educational/ intellectual powerhouses. She married into what is well, was widely considered, the pinnacle of Fundie families then compound that with marrying the heir to the throne. Fulfilling the high expectations of her being the docile obedient broodmare wife is all she really could be and that's really sad.
You can't really blame her for blindly following this path because that's all she was ever groomed for. From the beginning, she was told to pray for a husband, no matter how fucked up and/or flawed he would be. After all, being married to a monster is more preferable to being a withered old spinster.
Nah, given the options of Josh or spinsterhood, I'd definitely choose spinsterhood, but I'm not a Fundie.
The argument that she is choosing this path and can leave at any time is pretty laughable. All she knows is Fundie world. In Fundie World, divorce is not something good women do. Good women suffer in silence. Also what would God say?! She would be turning her back on her sacred marriage vows and that would dishonor God, herself and her children.
But let's pull the Christian Fundamentalism aspect out of her leaving. She has seven children, one of which was just born a few months ago. If she were to leave where could she go? Her entire world is that of the Christian Fundamentalist community. If they all turn their backs on her what is she going to do for support? Jim Boob (another Snark community reference) isn't likely to help a woman who abandoned his precious first born in his hour of need and he definitely seems like the type to use every legal trick in the book to take her children away from her forever.
Side Note: If you think about it, this seems like an excellent way to keep your women under control. Leave them educationally neglected and completely unable to financially provide for themselves let alone the 4+ children they've been saddled with. Then threaten them with legally removing the children if the threat of pissing off God and going to hell isn't scary enough. That's really fucked up.
Ultimately, if Anna Duggar did leave she would need a lot of support systems to make sure she never went back. She definitely would need trauma therapy, regular therapy (specifically a therapist that specializes in spiritual abuse and/or cults), some form of financial support, basic adult education classes, housing for her and all her children, and competent legal representation, I.e. extremely expensive legal representation. I don't see any of that happening for her. From where I'm sitting that all seems very daunting and I'm an outsider looking in, I'm certain that would seem like an impossibility if I were her. So she is ultimately left with no other options but to remain a dutiful and "docile obedient broodmare wife" who is hopelessly trapped in an unhappy sham marriage to an atrocious monster who will more than likely spend at least 5 years in prison (fingers crossed that it will be at least 15 years) for the disgusting crimes he's committed.
Anna Duggar sadly doesn't have any easy choices available to her, so she takes the easy way out. Actually, it's not the easy way out, it's more or less the disassociative way out. Having pretty much no good choices isn't a choice at all, so for her the beat goes on but only because there is no other beat to dance to.